But for some reason, sleep would not take us. “I was afraid that you would not come up again from the darkness,” I confessed. I opened my eyes, but stared up at the ceiling because it was too difficult to look at her. “I thought I had lost you forever and – I realized I would never forgive myself if I failed to protect you again.”
Rapunzel let out a small, frustrated sigh and pulled tighter against me. “Why is everything always your responsibility or your fault? Shouldn’t I take some responsibility for my own choices?”
I tried again. “I never would have forgiven myself if you were taken from me before we worked through our problems.”
“Ailynn, if this past year has proved anything, it is that love does not make us perfect. You have forgiven me for my betrayal, but you haven’t even begun to forgive yourself. Don’t you think you deserve it?”
“But–”
“You did protect me. Look at me.” She stroked the fingertips of her right hand down my cheek, leaving a red flush behind as she turned my head towards her with a gentle push. “Feel me.” She leaned forwards until her lips were only a breath away from mine. “I’m here. Right here. And we’re safe.”
And then she kissed me. Our weariness evaporated.
We undressed each other with great care and tenderness, peeling away clothing to reveal strips of silken skin. Gooseflesh rose on my arms as she touched me. My body knew and reacted to the ghosting, whisper-light caress of her warm palms. Before, we walked the razor thin wire of need and desperation, the unspoken line of pleasure in possessiveness, the need to take and claim driving out all of the softer emotions. This time, it was all gentleness in slow, trusting kisses, each whisper and touch a sweet promise.
“Is this all right?” I asked as I kissed above the collar of her shirt, familiarizing myself with the salty taste of her skin. “If you don’t feel well enough yet…”
“More than all right,” she assured me, tugging suggestively at the hem of my own shirt. We both needed this connection, this affirmation, a solidification of our new bond. Placing her hand directly over my rapidly beating heart, the line of her lips split in an affectionate smile. “Does my touch do that to you? Make your heart race?”
I returned the smile. “You know it does,” I told her.
Insistent, but not over-eager, my lover helped me off with my shirt as my hand crept into the stiff confines of her leggings, finding her wet and swollen for me already. I caught my bottom lip between my teeth, stifling a groan.
Almost straddling my hips now, she gazed down at me with half-lidded, lustful eyes. I only needed to straighten my curled fingers the slightest bit to feel more of her. She moaned at the sudden, welcome fullness, which coaxed another answering pulse from between my own legs.
“Oh,” she sighed, tipping her head back. “I want – to feel…”
“More skin?”
She whimpered in protest when I removed my hand, but allowed me to ease her leggings the rest of the way down her thighs. Tossing them aside, she pushed down her growing need to help me undress as well. Clinging to each other in a lover’s embrace, I felt as though I was holding a goddess in my arms. Wanting to feel her lips, I took her mouth in a searching kiss. Rapunzel guided me, coaxing the fingers of my right hand to wind around the slats of the headboard while my left combed through her hair. It was longer now, always continuing to grow, but somehow beautiful in its wildness.
Her hands mapped the dips and plains of my torso, pausing to tease visibly excited breasts and nipples, testing their weight and shape as her mouth trailed down from swollen lips to suckle at my chin.
I was awash in both old memories and new sensations. It all seemed like too much for my over-stimulated body to bear. Somehow, I had expected this encounter to mirror the handful of times we had already shared, but it was different. This time, she was meeting me on equal footing instead of letting me purge my anger in her. It was better.
Shaking fingertips traced the familiar shape of my face, drawing random patterns over my cheeks and chin. They touched the sensitive edges of my lips, following the curve and dipping just between until I was kissing them. My eyes drifted shut and my breath hitched.
My body ached for her to move inside, to fill me, to claim me and offer reassurance and love. I wondered if I would shake apart into a thousand pieces. Somehow, I knew that if I did shatter, Rapunzel would help piece me back together. My lungs could not seem to take in enough air and my heart tried to pound its way out of my chest. Every inch of my skin seared with a fierce, burning heat.
Gentle, hesitant fingers curled against soft velvet walls, coaxing another pulse of wetness from me and gliding easily inside. She pushed deeper, filling me until it burned, straining the small, twitching muscles in her wrist. Our foreheads met and I felt her warm breath against my cheek. Gooseflesh rose along my arms and thighs, but she only smiled, her eyes full of wonder at touching me, feeling me, loving me.
A calm, soothing hand stroked up and down my side in a steady line as her fingers began to twist inside of me, stretching me, easing out and then sinking deeper. I shivered, but did not make a sound, trying desperately to absorb everything, remember everything. The rush of blood and heat between my legs had me blossoming open against her hand, and I felt vulnerable and exposed.
My peak was a deep, shuddering thing, sharp and aching of pleasure. I felt myself spilling over, pouring in to her, wanting us to be as close as possible. I clutched Rapunzel’s shoulders, letting her kiss swallow my cries. As the release crashed over me in waves of heat and color and sound, her hand tangled in my hair, curving around the back of my neck, guiding our lips together. She kept kissing me as the hand between my legs stilled, unwilling to let me pull away. I had no desire to.
“We are finally together, aren’t we?” she whispered, and I knew what she meant. We had touched each other in anger, in pain and desperation, but never softly, never slowly, simply because we were two people in love. It was the same, and yet it was wholly different.
“I love you,” I panted, surprised that I was able to speak at all.
“And I you.”
I sighed happily, resting my arm over the swell of Rapunzel’s stomach. She tried to remove her hand, but I gripped her wrist softly, silently urging her to stay. I did not want to sever the intimate connection just yet. “They stir when you touch me,” she breathed, closing her eyes and kissing my cheek once, twice.
“When I touch your stomach or when I make love to you?” I asked sleepily.
“When you touch me. The last time you made love to me, they were not big enough for me to feel.”
My eyes, which had been drifting shut, instantly snapped back open. She was right. I was tired, but surely I could summon the energy for so sweet a prize. “Well,” I said, letting my hand drift lower and kissing the point of her chin, “we should do something about that.”
“Ailynn, I need…” Rapunzel said in a strangled whisper, unable to complete her thought.
“You need…?” I prompted. Hearing that I was loved and wanted was a balm for all of my old hurts. Whenever I was insecure, I would remember this moment, this woman, needing me. I must have some goodness in me if I managed to capture the heart of someone so wonderful.
“I need you. Just you. I always have,” she admitted shakily. My heart swelled with love. Kissing Rapunzel deeply, I tried to help her out of her remaining clothes, tossing them to the side of the bed without tearing my mouth away from hers. This time, there were no barriers in my way as I grazed excited, wet flesh with my fingertips, drawing out every sensation that traveled up my arm and savoring it.
I spent precious moments exploring, learning, taking my time. There was no rush or anger, only the two of us. Her hands reached for my shoulders, clutching desperately as I curled inside of her with one finger, then two, soft warmth gripping them with a tight burn. The low gasps and cries of encouragement made my head spin and I felt my own need rising again, but I ignored it. After all we had been through, sh
e deserved this careful, loving attention. We deserved this. Needed this.
“I love you,” she said, breathing heavily as her pelvis began to rock, urging me to quicken my pace. I indulged her and stopped teasing. Even though she was partially on her side, she draped one slender, warm leg over mine, one of her free hands sliding down the curve of my side to cup my hip, drawing me closer.
But it was not enough. Untangling myself from her arms and legs, I explored her throat and shoulders, pausing to tease the excited tips of her breasts to hardness with my mouth, kissing my way across her chest from one to the other. She gasped and shuddered, so responsive under my tongue, and I ached to feel more of her.
I tried my best to pace myself, taking the time to appreciate the curve of her stomach, learn the flair of her hips, stroke the twitching muscles in her thighs with my palms, but she was impatient. When she touched my cheek, brushing the curtain of loose hair away from my face so that she could see me and begged with her eyes, it was impossible to hold back.
Stealing one final glance at Rapunzel’s flushed face, her kiss-swollen lips, I draped one of her legs over my shoulder and lowered my head. I did not hesitate, pushing forward with an insistent tongue, wrapping my lips around her and sucking hard. The taste, the heat, the soft sounds that spilled from her lips almost like prayers as her head tipped back, it was soul shaking. I had the brief, impossible thought that this was all I would ever need.
I tried to delay it, to build her up with slow, rhythmic sweeps of my tongue, wanting her to enjoy this for as long as possible, but Rapunzel could only hold back for so long. I felt a surge of love and pride as her muscles locked, trying to arch off of the bed as I anchored her hips to the mattress. One hand fisted the sheets while the other wove into my hair, holding me closer, tighter, as her entire body trembled.
Unwilling to stop, I rode the crest of the wave with her, curling my fingers and pushing up, seeking the place inside of her that would send her shattering to pieces. That coaxed even more wetness from her and a sob broke in her throat, as much of my name as she could form. When the deep, crushing spasms faded to small twitches, she finally let go of my hair and collapsed backwards, the strain in her face softening.
Wanting to stay close to her, I moved up to leave another kiss on her stomach, but found myself pulled up to her waiting lips instead. Catching my lower lip between her teeth, she tugged on it lightly before nuzzling just under my chin. “I love you, Ailynn.”
My face split in a smile. “I love you too, Tuathe.”
“Will you tell me a story?”
I looked down into her soft brown eyes, disbelieving, but she seemed completely serious. “What? That wasn’t enough to entertain you, dear heart?”
She smiled back at me. “It was… very stimulating. But we would like a story to fall asleep to.” It reminded me of simpler times when I had lulled her to sleep with my voice. The memories were happy instead of bittersweet and I welcomed them.
“We would?” I asked, reaching down to rub circles on her abdomen. I felt the flutter of a child’s foot or fist tap against my open hand.
“Yes, we would.”
“Which story?”
“They haven’t heard the story of Princess Kirste and the mermaid.”
I dropped a lingering kiss on her forehead. “But you have.”
“I want to hear it again.”
“All right. The sight of the beautiful creature before her sucked Kirste’s breath right out of her chest. Her light-colored hair was long and swept to one side, and a filmy white sheet was draped over her shoulders…”
The End
The Witch's Daughter Page 21